Halls of shadow, p.21
Halls of Shadow, page 21
The handmaiden looked toward a doorway in the hall, then back at Maya. "Not well. She lingers near death. She too might not survive till the morrow."
"Then I will speak to her at once," said Maya. She turned toward Abishag. "Wait for me here. This I must do alone."
Leaving the handmaiden and Abishag behind, Maya opened the door and stepped into a humble bedchamber. The brick walls were bare but for a silver pomegranate, life-sized, that hung from a peg. Prayer scrolls rested on a table, and the window afforded a view of the cemetery. In a bed by the window lay Avinasi, royal lumer of Zohar.
Maya paused, for a moment too overcome to speak or step closer. She had always known Avinasi to be old, of seemingly infinite age and wisdom, the lumer who had served her grandfather and his father before him. Yet there had always been vigor to Avinasi, thriving life in her shrewd eyes. The wizened figure, roaming the palace, all chinking with jewels and scented with spices, had seemed as eternal as the city itself. Yet now this city was dying, and so was its lumer.
It hadn't even been a year since Maya had last seen Avinasi, but she seemed to have aged decades. Avinasi wasn't just gaunt. She was skeletal, so small, so frail, shrunken to the size of a child. Her wrinkled skin clung to her skull. It was hard to believe that she still lived, that this wasn't an emaciated corpse. Yet the chest still rose and fell, and breath rattled through the lungs. Maya found her feet again, stepped forward, knelt at the bedside, and clasped Avinasi's hand. It felt like holding a talon.
"Avinasi," Maya whispered. "It's me. It's Maya."
The ancient lumer took a raspy breath, opened her eyes, and smiled wanly, gums toothless. "Mother," she whispered. "Mother, it . . ." She cringed. "It hurts, Mother. It hurts me. They hurt me."
Maya stroked the old woman's brittle cheek, like stroking papyrus. "It's all right. You're safe. Soon the pain will end." Maya lit a flicker of lume and let the light flow into the old woman. Avinasi's breathing calmed.
"Do the doves still fly in the garden?" Avinasi asked, raising glazed eyes toward the window. "I saw them fly. I saw them fly from winter. Do they still live in our tree?"
Maya squeezed Avinasi's hand. "Avinasi, it's Maya. Can you hear me?"
The lumer blinked, her eyes finally focusing on Maya's. She gave a small gasp. "Maya. Maya Sela." She struggled to rise, could not. "I sent you east. I sent you into the desert to find a house of Luminosity . . ."
Maya nodded. "I found the house. And I learned from Namtar. And I completed the Luminous Writ. I've come back."
Avinasi's fingers tightened around Maya's hand with surprising strength. Tears dampened the old lumer's eyes. "You've returned through the Gate of Tears, the hidden eighth gate of the city, all in white, all in light, bringing healing to the hurt, bringing hope to those who despair, as lumers foresaw in days of old."
"But . . ." Maya lowered her head. "I brought evil with me. A shadow followed me into the city. A shadow that I feared in my childhood, a shadow that hid under my bed or in my closet, yet which I never saw. A man in a black robe, with furrowed gray skin, with fingers tipped with red. He faced me in the desert. He brought illness to the soldiers of Zohar. He shattered the gates of the city, letting in the legions. Avinasi, who is he? What is his name?"
Sadness filled Avinasi's eyes. She turned her head away, looking at the wall.
"Avinasi, won't you tell me?" Maya stepped around the bed, facing her again.
The old lumer looked up at the ceiling. "Are the doves flying again, Mother? Are—"
"Please," Maya said. "I'm not afraid."
Avinasi grew still and silent. She took a deep breath, then turned her eyes back toward Maya. "Some truths are best left unknown. Some shadows are best not pierced by light."
"And yet I must know him," said Maya, "for he has ever been my greatest enemy, and he will set all this city to ruin unless I can fight him, cast him back. Who is he?"
Wincing, Avinasi struggled to reach for a cup of water. She gulped weakly, just a few drops, and placed the cup down. From outside rose the sounds of war—clashing iron, dying men, stones and steel.
"When the adversary tore down the gates of Beth Eloh," said Avinasi, "did he rise after great light?"
Maya frowned. "I had . . ." She swallowed, suddenly afraid to reveal this truth, this forbidden magic, but she would hold no secrets today. "I did what the Luminous Writ forbids. I resurrected a dead man."
"This had not been done in a thousand years," Avinasi said. "The blood of Elior flows through you. Your power is greater than any lumer who now lives. To resurrect the dead casts more light than any have shone here since the days of Elshalom. And every light, Maya, must cast a shadow."
"But Luminosity is not like a candle or torch," Maya said. "It's light that flows from Eloh's grace."
"It is different than other lights, yet the same. There cannot be light without darkness, Maya. Even the light of Luminosity casts shadows. Every time we sisters of Luminosity invoke the light, we cast shadows. Small and flitting, usually. We might heal the broken bone of a friend, only for another friend to later trip, to fall, to suffer a similar injury. We might gaze into the future, seeking whispers in the light, only to pollute that future with obstacles and hardships. Before illness fell in this city, before the Gray Death spread—did you use the light?"
Maya shuddered, icy fingers trailing through her. She nodded. "I healed many that day. Soldiers wounded in the war. It was only after I healed them that the Gray Death spread, that he emerged, that—"
Maya gasped. She stepped back so suddenly that she slammed into the side table, scattering scrolls. The cup of water fell and shattered against the floor.
Avinasi nodded. "When you resurrected the dead, your light—a brilliant pillar that rose to the sky—cast a great shadow from which he rose. Who is the adversary, Maya? He is you. He is your shadow, as Luminosity casts it. He bears the form you gave him, the form of a monster you feared as a child, a monster you imagined hid under your bed. He is the shadow of Maya Sela, and he will forever trail behind you whenever you cast your light."
Maya felt the blood drain from her face.
"No," she whispered. "No. It cannot be. You lie."
Avinasi's eyes closed.
Maya trembled. She thought back to all those times she had seen him, sensed him. Lurking in her closet. Flitting in and out of her memory like a dream. Rising before her in the desert. Moving through the crowd of Beth Eloh. Rising stronger, more powerful than ever in Beth Eloh. As her strength had grown—as she had traveled near the House of Luminosity, cast magic at the wall, resurrected her brother—his shadow had darkened.
My shadow, Maya thought. He is me.
"Avinasi," she whispered.
The lumer lay still.
Maya stepped closer. "Avinasi . . ."
She leaped back. He stared from the shadows, lurking over the corpse of the ancient lumer, claws clutching the flesh. He stared up from his hood, furrowed skin clinging to his skull. A phallic gray head, eyes yellow and serpentine.
Maya spun around and fled the chamber.
Abishag was waiting for her in the corridor.
"Maya!" the girl cried.
Maya paused for an instant, staring at the girl—her kind eyes, her gentle heart.
I put her in danger, Maya thought. I put everyone in danger. All those around me. All those who died here. Because of the shadows I cast.
She turned. She ran from Abishag, leaving the girl behind. She ran through the palace, lost, trapped in the labyrinth. The shadows danced around her.
Her mind reeled. She had healed a dog on a hill; not moments later, the shadow of Aelar had fallen across the land. She had traveled toward a great source of lume in the east; on the cusp of its light, the adversary had raised the desert against her. She had written the Luminous Writ, weaving her magic into the scroll; the Dagonites had appeared and shattered the House of Luminosity.
But how could this be? Why had Namtar never told her? Why had the Luminous Writ not described the danger? Why—
Maya paused. She leaned against the corridor wall, feeling sick.
Namtar never knew, Maya realized. Perhaps no other lumer in the world knows this truth.
She thought back to the words she had transcribed in the last chapter of the Luminous Writ.
"Every light must cast a shadow," she whispered.
She had not understood those words then, had thought them mere poetry, a single line among thousands of lines.
She turned toward a window. The last defenders of Zohar stood on the wall around the Mount, desperate to hold back the onslaught. Tens of thousands of Aelarians filled the streets of Beth Eloh, and farther in the distance, Maya could just make out the shattered gatehouse that led to the wilderness.
My fault. Tears streamed down her cheeks. My shadow. He is me. He was always me.
Maya fell to her knees. She trembled. All the world seemed to close in around her, wrapping her in light and in shadows.
TIRUS
He stood on the city wall, watching the battle from above. He nodded.
"Good. Excellent." He bit into a peach. The juice dripped down his chin. "See there by the hill? The cavalry charges from two sides, flanking the barbarians. Our numbers our smaller, but with speed, with javelins, with scythed wheels, we strike terror into their hearts and iron into their flesh."
Tirus had sent out only three hundred riders, a small sally; thousands of horses still waited within the walls of Aelar. The Gaelian horde was large, true enough, but Aelar was a massive city, the greatest city the world had ever and would ever know. The barbarians had spread out thinly to surround it, each tribe defending another road toward another sealed gate. Tirus now stood facing the northern countryside, watching his cavalry ride in rings around one tribe of brutes. The Gaelians were tall, powerful people, all fur and hair and odor, and slow as lumbering bears. The legions' horses galloped, and arrows and spears rained onto the Gaelians, who were helpless to stop the onslaught. Whenever the brutes charged, the chariots changed course, then drove in from another angle. Their scythed wheels mowed men down.
"It's all rather exciting," said Julia. Her eyes shone as she watched the battle. She stood beside Tirus on the city wall, wearing a splendid stola of crimson silk, tiny gold eagles flying across the fabric. A tiara held back her flowing black locks and their single white streak. "My sister never did enjoy watching the wars, did she?"
Tirus snorted. "My wife was fond of nothing. She had no passions other than complaining. She could make a statue wither by staring at it." He looked at Julia. "But you are alive, my dear. You brim with life, with passion, with lust."
He reached out. With his wide fingers, he grabbed Julia's breast and squeezed. Her smile grew.
"Oh, look there!" Julia pointed. "A rain of arrows!"
Indeed, the chariots were now firing a volley from all sides, tearing into the Gaelians.
"The siege might yet last a while," Tirus said. "There are thousands of those fucking barbarians outside our city. But sally after sally, we'll decimate them."
He puffed out his chest as he remembered his victory at the port, sailing into Aelar with two fresh legions. True, the Gaelians had smashed the aqueducts leading into the city, and the bathhouses had run dry. True, the barbarians controlled the roads. But Aelaria Maritima, the grand port of Aelar, was still under Tirus's control. Through that port, he could summon more troops, food, and wine as necessary. Atalia Sela had been unable to seize that port from him. The rat was now his to torment.
If only I had any fucking lumers left, Tirus thought. Lumers could instantly contact governors around the Encircled Sea, summoning more aid for Aelar. But Tirus had left his own family lumer with Claudia in Zohar. Meanwhile, the imperial lumer was dead—they had found her shriveled corpse in the dungeon beneath the Acropolis. And every other lumer in Aelar, it seemed, had gone mad, rebelling against her masters. By now, the witches were all either butchered or in hiding. He'd have to rely on the old methods to call for aid: ships and scrolls. It was slow work, but then again, Tirus had waited for decades to become emperor. He could wait out a few months of siege.
He wrapped his arm around Julia, his beloved. He had waited years for her too. "The barbarians will understand, my dear Julia, why Aelar has not fallen in five hundred years. Why we will never fall. We'll bleed them, slowly, day by day, until they are ravaged and we sing the songs of our triumph."
He kissed her hard on the lips. Tirus was no longer a young man. Comfortably in his fifties, he had grown stocky, layers of fat now coating his muscles and big bones, and he could no longer, perhaps, fuck a woman with the vigor of youth. Yet Julia made him feel young again. Julia was perhaps not as young a woman as Tirus normally favored—she was well into her thirties, already showing the signs of age—but there was fire to her, there was passion, and she stirred his blood.
"Come, Julia," he said. "We head to the Amphitheatrum, where we celebrate my ascension. Once the Gaelian fleet is destroyed, we will be wed in triumph, and all the Empire will celebrate."
In the field, the Aelarian sortie was returning home. The chariots thundered across the field, heading toward Octavius Gate. Tirus himself had ordered that gate opened, securing it with wooden palisades and legionary patrols, allowing the sallies to exit and reenter the city under heavy guard. Tirus turned away from the battle. Holding Julia's hand, he guided her off the wall and into their chariot.
As Tirus rode through the city, he nodded in satisfaction. When he had first sailed into Aelar, he had found a population hiding in their homes or praying for mercy in temples, the city shut down with fear. Today the extra legions he had brought here lined the streets, and the supplies on his ships filled taverns, granaries, and homes. More people now roamed the streets, shopped at markets, even laughed at the local buskers. As Tirus rode by, surrounded by riders and marching legionaries, the people bowed before him, blessing his name.
"Emperor Tirus smites the Gaelians!" cried a man on a balcony.
"Hail Emperor Tirus!"
Finally they reached the Acropolis, rode up the hill, and headed toward the Amphitheatrum. Many theaters rose around the Encircled Sea, entertaining millions with dances, plays, athletic competitions, and gladiator fights. But none rose as large as the Amphitheatrum, the amphitheater of emperors, paid for with plundered gold from across the world. Rings of arches rose here, soaring taller than the imperial palace, and within each arch stood a marble god. Tirus rode his chariot through a gateway, entering the arena. A hundred thousand spectators already filled the seats, cheering for their new emperor. Tirus rode a ring around the arena, Julia on his arm, the crowd adoring him.
For this I waited all my life, he thought. To leave that fucking desert province. To reign in Aelar. To ride with Julia, not her withered older sister.
It was the glory Tirus had always craved. And soon—soon he would crush all his enemies. The Zoharites in the desert. The Gaelians outside his walls. That sniveling pup Seneca who still lurked in Nur, fucking his swarthy barbarian queen. They would all perish, and he would reign over their ruin.
He rode his chariot out of the arena and dismounted. Guards marched around them as Tirus and Julia climbed the stairs toward their seats. The commoners sat on hard stone, crowded together, some so high up they could barely see the arena below. But the emperor of Aelar could watch the games in splendor. The imperial box, worked into the first tier of the amphitheater, was palatial. Elaborate Sekadian rugs covered the floor. Behind Tirus, a tunnel led into a chamber of opulence where slaves, feasts, and courtesans awaited, should he seek distraction from the games. An ivory throne rose here, facing the arena, and two red columns flanked it, topped with golden eagles. As Tirus took his seat, slave girls knelt before him, bare-breasted and beautiful, and washed his feet. Another slave, perfumed and jeweled and adorned with henna, poured him wine into a goblet. Tonight, Tirus would take these slaves into his palace, would have them warm his bed, even as he took Julia there. The emperor of Aelar enjoyed not just one woman but a harem, and all the comforts of an emperor would be his.
I earned this. For twenty years, I languished in the desert, doing Marcus's bidding. Now the old goat and his bitch daughter are dead. Now let me savor my reward.
Guards blew silver trumpets, and dancers emerged into the arena, some pirouetting on the backs of elephants, dazzling the crowd. Tirus had no patience for dancers. As the performance went on, he looked over the crowd. A hundred thousand Aelarians, all eager for the games to begin. He looked across the stone seats nearby, a single tier higher up, just to the right. A young man in a humble cotton tunic sat there, brown hair falling limply across his brow. Just another face in the crowd, perhaps a peddler or mason who had scrambled together enough coins for a decent seat. But Tirus knew his name. The young man—he seemed barely more than a boy—gave Tirus a glance, then looked away. There sat Caelius, lord of the Magisterian Guard.
He watches me more than he watches the show, Tirus thought. An itch tugged at his shoulder. Sitting here in this golden box, he felt like a marionette in a puppet show—and above him, the puppeteer.
Yes, it was Caelius who had assassinated Porcia, Caelius who had summoned him here, Caelius who had placed the imperial laurel on his brow. And they were Caelius's men, soldiers of the Magisterian Guard, who had not left Tirus's side since his return into Aelar. Even now, they flanked his throne, armor burnished, faces blank.
As Tirus stared at the young man in the crowd, he imagined wrapping his hands around that throat, squeezing until he heard a crack. Tirus did not fear the gods, but he feared that boy. Until Caelius died, Tirus would not be true lord of Aelar.
But not yet. Not yet. Caelius still had a role to play, was still an ally, for he was a puppeteer of more than one marionette. His strings spread across the Empire, tugging at governors and generals far across the Encircled Sea. For now, Tirus would keep Caelius on collar and chain—though often he wondered who wore the collar and who held the leash.
